The Sheldon Cooper Tribulations
by TakemylovedowntoVioletHill
Summary: A group of stories talking about Sheldon's problems with social situations and how he'd rather be left to his books and physics then be left to understand the paradox of society; the one unsolvable problem to him.
1. Chapter 1

I fiddled with my pencil as the professor droned on about the trivial matters concerning the study of art. It was one of the only classes that irritated me, English was another one…

"Mr. Cooper!" I heard the grizzly man say. I looked up and felt thirty pairs of eyes on me.

"Yes Professor?" I replied. He looked at me over his spectacles.

"Are you listening to me young man?" he asked. In truth I really wasn't, I could care less about the thought processes that drove Picasso to pick up a brush and make a series of colorful scribbles.

"Yes sir, I'm really quite fascinated, please carry on." I said my voice had yet to drop so it wafted through the room in an eerie manner.

The man nodded and carried on with his lecture, moving on to the different types of strokes used in one of his self-portraits.

He was mid-sentence when the bell rang. I rose, my lanky arms struggling to gather up all my things and head to my last class for the day: English.

I detested this class with a passion I hadn't known since Timothy Gorelov had dumped my chocolate milk down bathroom sink before shoving my head into a toilet. I shouldered my backpack and began moving, hauling open the heavy wooden doors that were keeping me from the main stream of students.

University life suited me… or at least the academics did. I never understood social dynamics very well, so I was just the oddball on the outside looking in. I had never thought I was missing much, it was just an unnecessary set of paradoxes and problems to be solved and while I was always up for a challenge I knew I would never ever be able to figure out the chemistry and physics that went behind human interaction.

I remembered as I walked down the hallway, negotiating my way through thousands of bodies, how many sleepless nights I would go through attempting to understand and recreate relationships with my fellow _homo sapiens_. Over time I had just taken to observing and mimicking, but success had evaded me.

There was no formula for emotions and it irritated me that I, Sheldon Cooper, fifteen years old, could not understand something as simple as what to do when someone walked up to you and introduced themselves.

I came to a halt in front of my classroom and entered. A small group of young adults, they stopped talking to stare at me as I walked in and put my bag down. The teacher was gone and I turned to them, "Do any of you know where Professor Clarke is?" I asked.

One of them cleared their throats. "Erm, yes, I do believe he went for coffee. But, aren't you… you're Sheldon Cooper." I nodded impatiently.

"Yes, this would be one of the universe's few truths." I said, utterly unimpressed with the extent of American adults' vocabularies.

"You're fifteen and studying for you doctorate here." A girl piped up. By this time I was tired of listening to them spit out obvious statements so I took a seat, ignoring them, and opened my laptop to attempt to pull up this week's assignment.

I worked in silence until the teacher entered; he smiled at all of us brightly before turning to the chalkboard and writing our assignment:

_The Ideal Companion in more than 3 pages_

I frowned at the board, the ideal companion? I racked my brain, this was exactly why I hated English class, they asked questions I didn't have the answer to and I couldn't learn on my own.

I raised my hand tentatively and the man turned to me. "Yes Mr. Cooper?" he asked.

"I, er, don't quite know what you mean. The ideal companion, like a friend?" I asked. He nodded.

"Exactly, I want it by the end of the week." He stated. I frowned even more.

_But I don't have any companions or an idea of what an ideal one would be._ I said to myself. The rest of the class passed by in a haze and when I boarded into my mother's station wagon later that afternoon my mind was whirring, focused on this new problem.


	2. Chapter 2

I lay in the grass in the backyard, my guinea pig Snowball happily frolicking on my chest. My mind was still processing the assignment in English, what was an ideal companion? I supposed it would be someone who would never question me, and know instantaneously that I was always right. A perfect companion would be happy to conduct experiments with me, be submissive but smart, funny but not mean.

But what did I know of companionship? I only had my lab upstairs to comfort me. _But you're a genius and why drag yourself down with emotional baggage? Science needs you, it's the only friend you'll ever need._ I had pacified myself with this thought many times before as I watched the curious social network of school and the people who filled it. I had always been alone, science or no science.

Meemaw had assured me it was because I was special, unlike other children. I had a great purpose and that I needed to use that to the best of my ability. I knew that she was only saying this to me to help soothe the fact that no one in their right mind would ever want to be friends with Sheldon Cooper.

I faintly recalled when I had been four or five, before I discovered the ugly truth; I used to think that I was Superman's long lost son. I was weak because I had been born on this planet, and he would come any day to take me home. That I was so smart because I was not human, I was a brilliant alien, a new race of hybrid… _homo novus_.

I would tell Meemaw for hours upon hours all about how I was just waiting to go home. She had casually peeled and chopped vegetables for dinner, nodding and looking interested for my sake.

"That's nice Sheldon, now go wash up for dinner sweetie." She would murmur, dumping the last of the scalloped potatoes into the pot.

Then I remembered little Natalie Winker. She too liked comic books, watched Justice League, and adored physics. But she wasn't as smart as I… in fact, she dimmed by comparison. We used to eat lunch together, I had recalled jumping up and running away as I had felt her hand caressing mine at the table. She had smiled at me and I had shook my head madly and got up and ran. I never talked to her again and in three years I graduated from that school and moved off to pursue the high school life. She was a nice companion. She had always patiently dealt with me, always open to a random science lesson.

She had wanted to be a veterinarian, and I had scoffed her ideas as stupid and childish.

"You want to do something with your life?" I had said haughtily, holding my head high. "Do something worth your time." She had just sat there, her little blonde braids swaying in the breeze, and then she turned and walked away. I had been flabbergasted.

Little Natalie, I didn't regret my actions of course. No, a physicist never regretted, only learned from his mistakes.

I sat up and looked a Snowball. He was a good companion; he never talked back, but was there when I needed him. He didn't ask for too much and allowed himself to be a test subject on my experiments. I had had an idea germinating in my brain involving a homemade CAT scanner…

"Sheldon!" Missy called from the back door, I looked up at my twin sister. She was popular and all, but not very bright. Beauty and no brains… here she was, pleasing facial features, lovely body (the curves of a woman, he added thoughtfully) and then there was him. Missy and Sheldon, never were there two more different people.

She was still in high school, whereas I was studying for my doctorate in Applied Physics. Her mind was stuck on the trivial matters of what to wear and I was worrying about whether or not I should've placed that zero in the triple negative x-fraction when it came to my latest particle accumulation theory I'd been developing.

I stood up, Snowball clutched in my hands. He was squeaking contentedly and my sister raised an eyebrow. "You can't bring him to dinner." She said flatly.

"I'm not; I'm putting him in a cardboard box inside my room to run a test on him." I replied. Missy's eyes widened but she knew better than to interfere.

The dinner table was silent as always, I spent it eating quietly and then dismissing myself to go upstairs and check on my guinea pig. I wasn't planning on running any experiments on him, but I told Missy that so I would be allowed to keep him in my room.

He squeaked in protest as I picked him up but they faded quietly into silence as I set him on my bed. He looked at me with those unknowing beady eyes as I heard a knock on my door. I turned my gaze to me mother as she opened it and smiled.

"Shelly hun," she drawled. "Your professor called, said you might have a problem with one of the assignments he'd given you."

I frowned, deeply insulted by this comment. "I assure you I can handle all homework given to me in the given amount of time." I stated. My mother raised an eyebrow as she sat down on my bed, picking up Snowball and petting him.

"He said that he doesn't think you have any friends to write about for that essay." She stated bluntly. I widened my eyes and looked at the wall.

"Well… I was going to write about Snowball." I replied honestly. She looked incredulous and shook her head.

"I know just the thing for you Shelly. Missy's school has a science club and their havin' a party down at the church. You're goin' this weekend to find some sciencey friends." She chirped, handing Snowball back to me.

I seethed darkly.

There was no way I would stand there listening to a bunch of impertinent nitwits talk about a field they knew nothing about. Of course, I could always use this as a lesson to teach them what they knew not of… yes, I would gain followers. Not friends, but a league of seasoned disciples.

I smiled at my mother and she closed her eyes, patting my head. "Shelly, I love you hun, but if you ever wanna make a friend you gotta learn to quit smilin' like that."


End file.
